Telstra to review IT team as chief quits

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Telstra's chief information officer, Jeff Smith, has resigned
and will leave the corporation at the end of next month.

Announcing the move to Telstra staff on Friday, Ted Pretty,
group managing director for technology, innovation and product,
said the move marked the completion of Mr Smith's "assignment to
bring together Telstra's IT groups, transform our IT delivery model
and develop new partnerships".

Mr Smith, an American who joined Telstra in 2002, has made no
statement about his reasons for leaving. A decision on his
replacement has not yet been made.

Mr Pretty, whose internal staff memo thanked Mr Smith "for
leading an outstanding team", said the move gave him the
"opportunity to review the IT leadership structure" in Telstra.

"We have reached the tail end of the IT Transformation project
and are about to embark on a more operational phase. I have every
confidence that the IT team can deliver real innovation and further
productivity gains to Telstra and I will make further announcements
shortly."

Although Telstra has a reputation for moving senior executives
regularly around its divisions, Mr Smith's tenure appears shorter
than some.

However, according to Mr Pretty, he had accomplished a good deal
since 2002, welding seven separate IT groups into a single
unit.

"He refocused the company on bringing IT skills back into the
organisation with the appointment of an additional 200 staff in the
2003-2004 financial year with the deep technical capability
required for keeping the intellectual property in-house," Mr Pretty
said.

Soon after his arrival Mr Smith announced plans to halve
Telstra's $1.5 billion annual IT budget by cutting costs and
outsourcing many services to Indian software development centres
run by IBM, Satyam and EDS. The change was slower than planned and
the cost-cutting target was not achieved, but no criticism is being
laid at Mr Smith's door.

Telecommunications analyst Paul Budde said Mr Smith had taken on
"a gigantic job in one of the largest IT companies in the world"
and had done a good job in a complex organisation.

"Of course there has been criticism and there has been praise;
that's the nature of a job as critically important as his," Mr
Budde said.

But overall, considerable improvements were achieved during very
challenging transitions for Telstra, he said.